


Through the Pain

by LibraryMage



Series: Break Your Chains [31]
Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Autistic Ezra Bridger, Father-Son Relationship, Found Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Past Character Death, Post-Episode: s04e13 A World Between Worlds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-11
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-06-25 17:46:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15645792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LibraryMage/pseuds/LibraryMage
Summary: Kanan couldn't follow Ezra into the world between worlds, but he can still be there to help when he comes back.





	Through the Pain

**Author's Note:**

> warning for: references to past (canonical) character death

_Ezra._

A distant but familiar voice rang in Ezra’s ears.

_Ezra, wake up._

_Dad?_ Ezra thought. _No, it can't be Dad.  He’s…_

_Ezra, come back to us._

Ezra’s eyes slowly opened, his vision swimming for a moment before it cleared up and he saw Kanan above him.  Ezra made himself focus on Kanan as he tried to get a sense of his surroundings.  He was lying down, his head resting on Kanan’s leg.  Kanan’s hand was on his forehead.  Ezra could feel warm tears on his face, but couldn’t remember when he’d started crying and only had the vaguest sense of why.

“Kanan,” he said, his voice breaking.

“It’s okay,” Kanan said.  “I’ve got you.”

Slowly, Ezra sat up and looked around.  He was back at the base camp hidden in the hills.  He and Kanan were sitting on the ground beside the Gauntlet.  Ezra’s breath caught in his throat as the memories flooded back.

“Kanan, I -- I saw them,” he said, his voice shaking.

“Saw who?” Kanan asked.

“I saw my parents,” Ezra said.  His voice broke as a fresh wave of tears welled up in his eyes.

He threw his arms around Kanan, burying his face in his master’s shoulder.

“It’s okay,” Kanan said, sliding his arms around Ezra.  “Just tell me what happened.”

* * *

 

_“Ezra.”_

_The voice echoed out of one of the portals that surrounded them.  Ezra froze in his tracks at the sound of it.  He knew that voice, and hearing it, he was torn between turning around to see for himself and running, putting as much distance between himself and that voice as he could._

_“Time for bed, sweetheart,” his mother said._

_“Can't I stay up?”_

_That voice was familiar, too.  It was his own voice.  He remembered this conversation.  It was seared into his mind.  One of the last conversations he’d had with his parents, as he tried to convince them to let him stay up until midnight had passed and it was officially his seventh birthday._

_Slowly, Ezra turned around, flinching at the sight that met his eyes.  His father was lifting him up off the couch.  The still-six-year-old version of Ezra was clinging to his father’s shoulders, his eyelids drooping._

_“You sure you can stay up that late?” his father was asking him, clearly teasing and knowing that the answer was no._

_"Yeah,” the younger version of Ezra said, defeating his own point as he trailed off with a yawn._

_“Come on,” his father said.  “Bedtime for you.”_

_As he carried the smaller Ezra to the stairs, Ezra watched as his mother settled onto the couch, deep in thought.  A moment later, his father returned to the room._

_“He's out already, isn't he?” his mother asked._

_“Before we even got to his room,” his father said, sitting down and sliding an arm around her shoulder._

_As Ezra watched, that contemplative, almost sad look crossed his mother’s face again._

_“What’s wrong?” his father asked._

_“I know we’re doing the right thing,” his mother said.  “But if something happens to us…”_

_“Ezra?”_

_Ezra jumped at the feeling of a hand on his shoulder.  Ahsoka stood beside him, watching him rather than the scene playing out in the portal before them.  He’d almost forgotten she was there._

_“It’s the night before they -- before the Empire --” Ezra tore his gaze away from the portal as he stopped speaking.  He couldn’t say it, and he knew he didn’t have to._

_Before he even realized the thought had formed in his head, Ezra was saying it out loud._

_“I can save them,” he said.  “I saved you.”_

_“Ezra,” Ahsoka said, her voice gentle, but revealing nothing of what she was thinking or feeling, “I won't tell you what you should do, but --”_

_Her voice broke off and Ezra could feel her reluctance and her pain at what she was about to say._

_“If you pull them out of this moment, you still grow up without them,” she said.  “You wouldn’t even know what happened to them.”_

_Something twisted violently in Ezra’s chest.  He knew she was right.  He tried to tell himself he didn’t care, asked himself how much worse it would really be if he’d woken up to find himself alone instead of watching them get dragged away by stormtroopers.  But it didn’t really matter, did it?  He’d still be left alone to fend for himself.  Maul could still find him, and with Ezra not knowing what had really happened, wondering if his parents had abandoned him, it would be that much easier for Maul to turn him against everything they’d taught him._

_“If I’d never lost them, none of this would have happened,” Ezra said, more to himself than to Ahsoka._

_But he **would** still lose them, unless he pulled his younger self through the portal, too, and he didn’t know what that would do to him._

_He forced himself to turn away from the vision, feeling like his chest was being ripped open as he faced Ahsoka._

_“I know I shouldn’t,” he muttered.  “I **know**.”_

* * *

 

Kanan’s arms tightened around Ezra, one of his hands running across Ezra’s hair.  Ezra’s tears only came down harder as he sobbed into Kanan’s shoulder.  He wanted the comfort Kanan was offering him.  He _needed_ it.  But he felt like something was ripping through his chest all over again.  He wanted it to be his parents holding him, telling him it was okay and he could get through this.  He’d been so _close_.  All he’d needed to do was reach out and pull them through the portal just like he’d done with Ahsoka.  It would have been so easy, and he’d been too afraid to do it.

And then he’d lost his chance.  The vision of his parents had been ripped away, replaced by a vision that turned the inside of Ezra’s chest to ice.  He knew instinctively who the man in the portal was, and knew to fear him.

They’d barely escaped, and Ezra had lost his chance to save his parents.  He knew he shouldn’t have done it.  He didn’t know what would have changed.  But he just wished he could go back and save them, no matter what the consequences might have been.

“Why didn’t I do it?” he muttered, talking more to himself than to Kanan.  “It would have been so easy.”

He wrenched himself away from Kanan’s embrace.  He’d betrayed his parents, leaving them behind to be arrested and eventually killed, and now he was turning to Kanan to comfort him and tell him it was okay, as if Kanan was some kind of _replacement_ for them.

“It’s alright, Ezra,” Kanan said.

“No, it’s not,” Ezra said.  “I could have saved them and I didn’t do it.  I let them die!”

“Ahsoka was right,” Kanan said.  “If you’d saved them, you still would have been alone.”

“But they’d be here now,” Ezra said.  “They’d be alive.”

“And who knows what would have happened to you?” Kanan said.

Ezra pulled his knees up to his chest, hugging his arms around them.  He knew Kanan was right, and Ahsoka was right, too, but they both had to know it wasn’t that simple.  Why did what happened to him matter more than what happened to his parents?

“I didn’t know them,” Kanan said, as if he knew exactly what Ezra was thinking, “but I don’t think your parents would want you risking something happening to you just to save them.  I know I’d never want that for you, and neither would Hera.”

Something seemed to snap inside Ezra’s chest.  He didn’t care if it felt like a betrayal, he _needed_ Kanan right now.  He uncurled himself from the tight ball he’d bunched himself into and leaned against Kanan’s side.  Kanan slid an arm around his shoulders.

“I’m so sorry you went through that,” Kanan said.  “That never should have happened.”

“No,” Ezra said.  “It shouldn’t.”

It shouldn’t have happened.  And that was the problem.  _None of it_ should have happened, and it had, anyway.  And whether he’d saved his parents or not, Ezra couldn’t have stopped it.

Still, as Ezra sat there, huddled against Kanan’s side, with Kanan’s arm around him, holding and comforting him, Ezra couldn’t help but think that at least one good thing had come of all the pain he’d lived through.


End file.
